News. Community. Wellness.

After a quick summer stroll through downtown Lindsay, one can see that this little town of ours is full of life. Trees and flowering plants take refuge on lawns and in neighbouring yards, and yet some of those plants are less than welcome. Dog-Strangling Vine is a highly invasive species which was introduced from Eurasia to the United States as a garden plant in the mid-1800s.

Now, in the 21st century, it has become increasingly prolific in Southern Ontario, competing with native plant species that are essential food sources for our insects, birds, and mammals. For those who can recognize its characteristic oval-shaped leaves, arranged in pairs on its fleshy stem, and seed pods which resemble green chili peppers, it is a frightful addition to Lindsay’s list of flora.

The support offered by many of the programs available through the Community Care Health & Care Network are self-explanatory and obvious. On closer examination, however, the case can be made that just as many of our services have multiple benefits. Case in point this month: our Adult Day Program for seniors and people with special needs.

One of the organization’s longest-running programs, Adult Day Program is offered multiple times each week at several locations throughout the municipality. Adult Day provides clients with a range of social, physical and recreational activities that are designed to meet the unique needs of each participant.

City of Kawartha Lakes Council will be making a decision on short term residential rentals in the City of Kawartha Lakes at the August 14 Council Meeting. City staff completed an extensive review of short term residential rentals and provided an informational report to Council at the June 19 Council meeting on the outcomes of the review and proposed options for consideration. Staff have developed three options for Council’s consideration.

It’s 9 a.m. at Victoria Park. Another hot, cloudless summer morning, so a picnic table in the shade of an oak tree in Victoria Park is a good place to be. It is in fact the perfect place to be to meet up with Megan Phillips, the City’s horticulturist. Megan and some of her six-member crew of summer students have some work to do in the park.

They aren’t hard to spot. A City truck pulls up and they all clamber out in steel-toed work-boots and fluorescent orange high-visibility t-shirts.

Just two days ago over the long weekend the Lindsay Advocate invited municipal candidates to share their opinion about the pilot’s cancellation. The Advocate also invited them to the basic income rally being held Aug. 7 at 12:30 pm in Victoria Park.

Pat Warren, candidate for Ward 6, says she may be unable to make the rally on Tuesday but says it was “unfortunate that the pilot project was cancelled.”

A mom and dad wait to talk to the crisis nurse in Lindsay’s Ross Memorial Hospital about their child, who has been brought to the emergency room several times for mental health situations in the last few months. The parents have been up all night and it shows: their eyes are clearly red and swollen from another night of crying and worrying, their brows wrinkled from another night of explaining — again — the situation to first responders.

Acronyms, diagnoses and waiting lists are duly recited with exhausted clarity — they sound and look like flood victims who have protected their home with a three-foot wall of sandbags (built exactly to recommended specifications) to stop a swollen river that’s six feet high and rising.

Roderick Benns recently interviewed Brett Goodwin, the dean at Fleming College’s Frost Campus in Lindsay, about the huge rise in popularity of its sustainable agriculture program.

Benns: The rise in the number of international students at Fleming is considerable. In the sustainable agriculture program, for instance, I believe 75-80 out of 87 students were international last year. We’ve heard some concerns that the infrastructure at the college is not keeping up with what is needed in the program (such as the calibre of the greenhouse facilities or specially customized classroom spaces). Are you challenged by this influx and what has (or what can) the college do to help with this?

For the past two decades, an annual summertime tradition in the McKechnie household has been the Model A Owners of Canada annual “Get-Away In A Model A” tour, usually taking place during the third weekend of August. Suitcases, lawn chairs, coolers, and umbrellas are packed into the back of our 1930 Model A Ford town sedan, which has been our family since my father purchased it from the late Doug Windrem, of Omemee, almost 30 years ago.

More than 130 riders took advantage of the second test run of a weekly shopping bus currently being tested for Kawartha Lakes.

The shopping bus is part of a resident-drafted, three-point plan to expand rural transportation for communities across Kawartha Lakes. Originally tested for a day in July, last week’s second trial run had a different route which included stops in: Lindsay, Long Beach, Fenelon Falls, Eganridge (to offer summer visitors a way to explore the area), Bobcaygeon, Dunsford, Omemee and Bethany.

Local MPP and Minister of Labour Laurie Scott says there were “too many concerns” about the Ontario Basic Income Pilot to let it go on — but then also noted if it were successful it would have been too expensive to implement Ontario-wide.

Scott, who was responding to questions provided by the Lindsay Advocate, made the seemingly contradictory remarks in her emailed response, although she wasn’t the only one. The lead minister on this file, Lisa MacLeod, said the same thing yesterday, in an effort to stem the growing pressure to see the decision reversed.

As advocates, we are fighting hard to keep the basic income program alive here in Lindsay. We are heartened by the strong support coming in, and yet we are also dismayed by comments that constantly circle around two big lies.

City says Victoria Manor has more residents with a higher degree of cognitive impairments. A CBC Marketplace investigation has named … More

Search

About

The Lindsay Advocate is an online news magazine for Lindsay, Ontario, Canada, focused on the social and economic wellness of the town. While we cover most aspects of community life, we have a particular interest in poverty reduction.